Black Rose
by ashehole
Summary: Zoe Reese is the last of her friends to make her choice, but why does she have to be so alone? The pain and fear of lonliness is too much to handle. What else is there to choose on such a black night? Oneshot.


**AN: Another little one-shot to help me out with my writing. I hope you like. This is before she meets Catty's father. I don't know how they met, but I'm sure it was probably after she turned. If not, oh well. Creative genius and all that.**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Daughters of the Moon. If I did, I would have made a lot of money, my name would be Lynne Ewing, and lots of other things would have happened. Lol.**

**Summary: Zoe Reese is the last of her friends to make her choice, but why does she have to be so alone? The pain and fear of lonliness is too much to handle. What else is there to choose on such a black night?**

Zoe Reese bit her thumb gently, shivering beneath the new moon, the dark of the moon. She had her head tilted up, her full lips parted softly, tears falling down her cheeks. This wasn't the easiest thing for her. In fact, you could even say that this decision would be a very life altering one. _A world altering one_.

Wiping the tears from her cheeks, Zoe began to pace. It was her birthday, her seventeenth birthday, a day she wished she could delay a day, a month, even a year or two! Frantically, her steps increased. She was alone, so alone now. The last to make her decision. She cursed her mother from giving birth to her in July, then she cursed Maggie for not telling her how she should make this stupid choice. In the end, she cursed everyone she knew, finally ending in the curse of the one that forced this choice on her: Selene, the goddess of the moon.

She just couldn't do this. It was too hard of a decision. She was very scared, sacred and oh-so alone. No one was there for her. No one could help her.

Maybe it wasn't the choice alone that scared her. Maybe it was the actual being alone part.

Zoe fell to her knees, her brown eyes appealing to the outline of the moon. She pleaded to it silently. _Light up_, she prayed. _Why did you have to be dark on the night of my birthday? Why, when I need you so much now?_

Shaky, angry hands ripped the moon amulet from her neck. It hurt when the chain cut into the skin at the back of her neck. It didn't matter. Pain didn't matter. She tossed it into the yard, screaming.

Her choices were either to become a guardian, or something along those lines, where she would disappear forever, or she could lose her lovely, destructive power and her goddess memories, becoming a real human. Those choices weren't good enough. They were filled with so many problems.

Desperately, without even thinking about it, she screamed into the dark night, "I don't want to decide. I willingly give my life to the Atrox!"

It took her a minute to understant what she had just done. Her body shivered with regret. How could she have even _thought_ of saying what she did? Simple. She hadn't thought of it at all. She just did, and it was too late now to recant her statement.

Stanton stepped forth from the shadows, as if in wait for her, stooping to pick up her moon amulet. He cupped it in his hands as he walked over to her. "Stand, Zoe."

With reluctance, Zoe stood, facing the man that would bring her to her new master. As that thought began to roll around in her head, it became easier to accept.

Stanton approached her, putting the amulet in her soft hands. Zoe stared down at it; where it had once been irridescent, it was now scorched black from her betrayal of the moon. Her hands clutched it tightly to her her breast as she pulled it closer, closing her eyes she did so.

"Is this it, Stanton?" She asked, opening her eyes to stare into the deep blue of Stanton's eyes before her. She felt lost, confused, and powerless for the moment. Was she beginning to have an actual conversation with her enemy now?

"Almost. You still have hope." Stanton held her face in his hands, ready to take the last of the hop shining in her heart. The hope that maybe, indeed, her Moon Mother hadn't abandoned her on the most important of days.

It was funny, as Zoe's last though was how the other Daughters would react to this action of her, this desperate act to stay a goddess. But, of course, they weren't even Daughters of the Moon anymore. They had either chosen to forget or were taken away to become something different. It didn't matter now. None of them would even remember that Zoe Reese had been there.


End file.
